The Vanilla planifolia was dethroned, when Hurricane Sandy battered, in October 2012, gusts of winds over 180 kilometers per hour affected eastern Cuba. The royal trees that once revered the beauty of orchid, yielded to the typhoon that outraged the flowers meticulously cultivated at the Center for Mountain Development.
The Vanilla planifolia was dethroned, when Hurricane Sandy battered, in October 2012, gusts of winds over 180 kilometers per hour affected eastern Cuba. The royal trees that once revered the beauty of orchid, yielded to the typhoon that outraged the flowers meticulously cultivated at the Center for Mountain Development.
Irliadis Urgellés Cardoza, scientific research of the institution saw with sorrow mameyes, avocados, atejes, fruit and timber trees fallen... and others that supported about 32 lines of these monocots that revered the bust of Celia Sanchez Manduley.
Ready to got to work, the Guantanamo researchers, who through Conservation, Monitoring, and Sustainable Use of the Orchid Flora of Nipe Sagua Baracoa Massif Project, have achieved the adaptation of 96 species of the more than 1022 collected in these mountains.
"We're still recovering from the ravages of Sandy” but we see the fruits of hard work that involved clearing fallen trees, recovery of orchids, building walls, in addition to the collection and planting of new species,” said Urgellés.
Patience and perseverance of scientists recovered the beauty of Limonar de Monte Ruz landscape with these plants, whose strange beauty originated in the popular imagination various vernacular names, inspired by the color, smell, shape of the flowers and life in each place.
Irliadis explains that there are examples of the combination of plant names like in the Black Orchid (Prosthechea cochleata), species distinguished by its purple color and other names as Guataca de Burro, the Cañuela or Vanilla, all present in the Development Center’s orchid garden, where experts have created a gene bank to preserve in situ living plant material of these majestic flowers.
And to crown the summit of Limonar mountains, as natural thrones, they step by step plant again Caimitos, Cupeyes, Majaguas and Yamaguas trees that are embellished by the attractiveness of orchids that grow under the protective gaze of other scientists as Amaury Diaz Rodriguez whom I heard him passionately defending these plants and highlighting their characteristics.
At the same time, the experts of Development Center present research projects by the senates of the Ministry of Science, in the forum the Guantanamo scientist argued that of the three hundred varieties of orchids registered in Cuba there are just eight commonly uses, upstream of the countless medical pharmaceutical properties like antirheumatic, anti-inflammatory and anti carcinogens and biological control.
Threatened by climate change, this lady of the vegetable kingdom is also a bio indicator of the impact of this phenomenon on ecosystems; a virtue added due to the popular use of one of the most popular spices Vanilla whose essence flavors many sweet recipes and is also used in the cosmetic industry.
Due to delicate, beautiful and exotic orchids, South American countries such as Venezuela, Costa Rica, Colombia, Guatemala, Panama, Honduras and Brazil have consecrated the honor of representing the national flower.
Orchid is a woman's name and a symbol of essences as diverse as the images that the shape of this flower suggest in the more than 25,000 species estimated worldwide. Orchids are also in Limonar de Monte Ruz, in the Guantanamo municipality of El Salvador, its reign, perhaps more humble than others, but vital for these majesties of the flora world that crown trees always in search of the sun.
Translation: Liubis Balart Martínez